Featured photos

Canada got the last hurrah at the Celebration of Light Saturday evening, closing the three-night event with a winning display. Canada was declared the winner of the event, with Brazil and China finishing second and third, respectively.

Hope in Shadows calendar: Mother, daughter show hopeful side of home (with video)

Photo calendar aims to present different stories and images of the Downtown Eastside

Amy Wilson and daughter MaiLoan Doan were both winners in the Hope in Shadows calendar awards Tuesday.

Photograph by: Wayne Leidenfrost
, Vancouver Sun

They’re putting themselves out there and they’re showing a piece of themselves as well as their community.

Carolyn Wong, Calendar project coordinator

VANCOUVER -- Amy Wilson and her daughter MaiLoan Doan saw lots of hope in the shadows of the Downtown Eastside on Tuesday.

Wilson took home the top prize in the competition for the annual Hope in Shadows calendar cover photograph. Her self-portrait with her best friend Shannon Wildman was taken using one of the 200 free Fuji disposable cameras handed out to neighbourhood residents in June by Hope in Shadows, which is coordinated by Pivot Legal Society.

The 2013 calendars are now for sale for $20. Unemployed and poor vendors receive one free calendar and buy the rest for $10 each and keep the difference.

This year, Hope in Shadows has printed 18,000 calendars, an increase of 1,000 from last year. In the past nine years, the calendar campaign has raised $128,000. Half the money goes to vendors and remainder to programs that include community legal resources.

Wilson said the winning photograph was taken at the last minute. She calls it Neverending Friendship.

“I was taking photos of my kids and I saw my friend coming with her kids,” Wilson said. “I still had a few left and I said, ‘Let’s take a picture of us.’ She said, ‘I look like crap.’ I said, ‘So do I. It doesn’t matter.’

“I threw my arm around her and took it right out in front of Hope in Shadows.”

Wilson receives $500 for her winning photograph. It will also appear as the photograph for the month of January 2013.

The other winner was her eight-year-old daughter MaiLoan, whose first name means future in Vietnamese. She received an honourable mention for taking a photograph of her nine-year-old brother Anthony peeking out from some bushes.

The two photographs were among 4,000 images taken by neighbourhood residents. They were winnowed down to 40 top photographs, which are used to illustrate the fundraising calendar.

Winners were announced in the theatre at the Carnegie Community Centre at Main and Hastings.

Among the photographers honoured was Rosa Matilpi. Her photograph of her friend Jackie holding a cat was chosen as the best portrait. On stage, Matilpi started tearing up; she recalled that her friend in the photograph had died. Back in her seat, Matilpi was hugged and congratulated by her friends.

Now in its 10th year, the calendar project came from listening to neighbourhood residents and helping them tell their stories, said Katrina Pacey, litigation director at Pivot.

“Our experience of this neighbourhood and this community has been of different struggles, yes, but also love, compassion and a commitment to social change,” she told about 100 people at the Carnegie.

Giving residents cameras to take photographs, she said, was a way to give people an opportunity to represent themselves to the world.

Carolyn Wong, project coordinator, said participants have told her they really appreciate the opportunity to be ambassadors for their neighbourhood and to show the strengths and beauty of their community.

“I think that a lot of the photos that they take are really personal,” she said. “They’re putting themselves out there and they’re showing a piece of themselves as well as their community. That storytelling is important, knowing that their voice is being heard and valued.”

Wong said most of the stories told about the Downtown Eastside tend to be negative.

“That’s what gets proliferated,” she said. “The public then has a conception of the neighbourhood that’s very narrow. There are many, many stories about this neighbourhood. It’s complex. There’s just not one alternative to the narrative that we hear from the media. There are hundreds and thousands of narratives of people’s personal experiences.”

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.